Rugby in America, the way it is and could be.

10 January 2013

USARFU plans to send a 20-something referee to New Zealand this March, in an effort to nourish younger officials with elite potential.

The governing body Monday announced an annual scholarship, named after the distinguished Bostonian Don Morrison, that is intended to underwrite season-long instruction and assignments in major rugby nations. This year's inaugural grant will place an 18- to 25-year-old ref in Canterbury.

The initiative will be generally welcomed. Whereas domestic referee societies are often criticized for rewarding seniority instead of potential, overseas placement promises not only sharpened technical skills but also accelerated opportunities. And one newly returned, dramatically better referee can improve matters for dozens of teams over the course of a season.

'I am not convinced there is any other way our referees can gain the experience they need or earn the necessary credibility within the [International Rugby Board] than through a program like this', one veteran official noted.

Host unions also prefer younger referees, USARFU referees director Ed Todd observed in an email. Neophytes don't compete with domestic officials for plumb appointments. Moreover, in New Zealand and elsewhere, one can work part-time to defray personal expenses under a 'holiday working visa'.

Selecting youngsters is perilous, however, in that they may fail to reach their potential, or professional and family demands may come to supersede their best intentions of advancing in rugby. While national-level players can go on to win lucrative overseas contracts, referees have no such opportunities.

Under the aegis of the US Rugby Football Foundation, a trio of young refs have recently gone to Canterbury, arguably the world's strongest province, with mixed outcomes. Brian Zapp has reached the so-called national panel; but another on the cusp of the premier ranking stepped away to pursue career interests.

Some 10 years ago, Boulder itself fostered similar placements, yielding national panelist Paul Bretz among others, but such efforts do not appear to have been sustained.

Through its year-old 'zone manager' program, USARFU has identified some 15-20 credible candidates, Todd said. The union is further soliciting applications as well as donations.

01 March 2011

A Virginia club is planning a fundraiser to benefit Christchurch, the New Zealand city recently leveled by earthquake.

Alexandria, which has been raising money for after-school and summer youth programs during screenings of Six Nations matches, is converting its March 12 event to contributions for a relief fund, the club said in a press release. The day's slate includes France-Italy and Ireland-Wales.

Though difficult to measure in terms of gross domestic product, rugby is perhaps the Pacific island nation's leading export. If you've played senior rugby in America, you've almost certainly played with Kiwis. Last week's disaster is therefore rippling throughout the US, among active players and old teammates, even though mainstream media has all but ignored the tragic event.

Yet American clubs are chronically cash poor, and in the midst of economic doldrums. So rallying on behalf of Christchurch is not only public spirited in the game's best tradition, but also a hopeful sign that the donors think they will be able raise additional sums in the future.

With a strong concentration of diplomats and sundry expats, the Washington DC area has traditionally staged an Ambassador's Shield contest, pitting Kiwis against the local opposition.

Separately, USARFU rebranded the College Premier League as the College Premier Division. 'Each of the teams are still classified as division 1 and therefore teams are not technically a league, but rather an elite division,' the union said in a press release. Coming just days before the fledgling league's kickoff, the move suggests commercial development has been tepid.

Friday's post, 'Colleges divided in four regions', incorrectly stated the cutoff for non-CPD division 1 teams to affiliate with conferences, should they wish to participate in USARFU's 2012 playoffs. It is June 1.

18 February 2011

Though few in number compared with football or baseball, applying rugby's rules can be bafflingly complex. The more so because elite players, coaches, and referees around the world are perpetually shaping and reshaping conceptual views.

Few topics are more contentious than the contest for possession of the ball and the offensive team's ability to move it quickly away from the tackle area. Thus the guidelines effectively function to focus of contemporary expectations.

In addition to clarifying the latest thinking, the GMG continue in American officialdom's tradition of innovation. In one notable example, US refs were among the first to collect the laws into a small, annotated handbook with helpful accessories. Subsequently, the IRB superseded the effort (with the unfortunate side effect of preempting a meaningful referee society revenue stream).

The guidelines debuted prior to the 2008 season, the product of referees working with Super League coaches. Favorably received, they were updated prior to 2009 so as be applicable to all levels of US rugby.

Last year, the IRB issued several directives that were sometimes called 'new laws'. 'They were not new laws, just re-emphasizes, which were already addressed in our GMGs. For example, the requirement of a distinct, four-count engagement sequence,' USARFU referee development director Ed Todd said in an email.

Discussion of the tackle has indeed been au courant among referee fora. Many are already looking for one of three indications that the player isn't holding on and doesn't have any weight on his arms: spreading the arms apart, showing both palms face up, or clapping one's hands together. Provided the player has gotten both feet on 'his' side of the tackled player before touching the ball again, any of these can be deemed evidence that the player may afterward legally go for the ball.

Also in 2011, the GMG section on assistant referees (i.e., touch judges) has been removed and will be reissued as a separate document.

30 July 2010

A leading rugby nonprofit is looking to win corporate funding for its ambition of giving a ball to every registered teenage player.

Next week, the US Rugby Football Foundation intends to submit a proposal to the Pepsi Refresh Project in hopes of a $250,000 grant. The merits will be judged largely on whether the pitch is one of the top two vote getters in Pepsi's online pool, which will launch on August 1.

Present and past US coaches Eddie O'Sullivan, Tom Billups, and Jack Clark as well as at least nine Eagle captains have lined up in support of the 'Ball 4 All' idea.

The campaign underlines the nonprofit sector's role in American rugby. More than is commonly understood, the game relies on a variety organizations to resources and development opportunities.

Such institutions range from USRFF to public and private schools sponsoring teams as well as rugby summer camps, from for-profit entities such as the USA 7s to the US Olympic Committee, now taking a more active role with the inclusion of 7s in the summer games.

USRFF's goal is reminiscent of USARFU's recent program to provide jerseys for college teams. Boulder's initiative, disbanded after two seasons, was tied to the union's imperative to project a sponsor's message into the university environment while diverting some of the proceeds elsewhere.

'If we are fortunate to be one of the two organizations to receive the top award of $250,000, we will use every cent of that money to purchase balls so that every youth and high school player registered with US Rugby will receive their own ball,' USRFF executive director and past US captain Brian Vizard wrote in one letter rounding up support.

'Receiving the first ball I ever owned elevated my play as that ball rarely left my side for the next 10 years. I took that ball to school, to the store, in the car, on dates. I even slept with it. But the constant handling and kicking improved my overall game and helped me get to the top of US rugby,' the standout eightman said.

The Pepsi Refresh Project provides 32 organizations with cash awards each month. USRFF feels August is the optimum month to compete for top prize.

Tuesday's post incorrectly described the commercial basis of the Collegiate Championship Invitational: USA 7s paid for the tournament and NBC paid for television production and air time, and the two bodies collaborated on ad sales, which were used to cover costs. USA 7s broken even on the debut event, according to people familiar with the matter.

Also, I made a hash of the distinction between players registered in the 'competitive season' (i.e., September to August) and the calendar year. To date, the number of players registered in the soon-to-end competitive season is near to 93,000, and will top the 2008-09 cycle by approximately 11 percent, according to national office staff.

23 June 2010

Paul Ganey, one of the more practical, persistent men in the long history of Southern California rugby, expired this past weekend.

Ganey helped found Loyola Marymount University's team in 1958 and went on to play for Los Angeles, a leading senior side in one of the country's stronger regions. But his lasting mark was made through many years of diligent regional administration.

He took up as president of Southern California just as American rugby began an era of off-field innovation that confused players and complicated volunteer work. Starting with the 1992 launch of USARFU's dues program, the next dozen or so years taxed the energy and common sense of local officials who often had to implement new initiatives without meaningful direction from the national body.

In addition to the Club and Individual Participation Program's initial lack of a central compliance mechanism, there was the dues-fueled growth but uncertain trajectory a national office headed by a succession of undistinguished executives, and the board of directors-led collapse of the senior Inter-Territorial Tournament, then the main conduit to the national team. All but lost in such turmoil was the territories' priority to manage everyday and championship competition, an imperative sometimes expressed by the saying that the game is for the players.

Ganey not only saw to it that games were played and champions crowned, but also faithfully carried the perspective to USARFU's board, where his views were authentically local without being narrowly provincial. Such voices have largely been muffled by the union's 2006 reorganization because the directors have evinced little organic understanding of America's domestic game, although Ganey and a few kindred spirits perserved in the congress.

Of course, Ganey himself played a pivotal role in another rivening moment, the fracturing of the old four-territory structure, as Southern California's 1995 split from the Pacific Coast preceded the more rambuctious dissolution of the Eastern territory into three. Why did the erstwhile local union do it? Particularly given the growing demands of CIPP, Ganey and his colleagues thought they could do a better job managing league competition and of course that perennial American bogey, player eligibility, than could a body responsible for a region from Seattle to Salt Lake to San Francisco to San Diego.

A contractor by profession, Ganey continued in Southern California's administration to the end and had been working on a history of American rugby.

Cheerful but not quite optimistic, skeptical but not really cynical, Ganey tried to see things for what they were and to make the best of them. It would hard to fete a figure whose career was occupied by bureaucratic currents. But for more than 50 years, Paul Ganey's intent was to clear the decks for players and teams to compete, and so it is fitting that Southern California's senior championship, the Ganey Cup, is named in his honor.

26 February 2010

Pink Jersey, Pink Tie organizers are hoping next weekend's Olympic Club-San Francisco Golden Gate charity match and auction will generate the equivalent of a full season's expenditure for many American teams.

'In 2009, the first year this event took place, we were able to raise over $16,000 for the KAM [Kathleen Ann McClenahan] Foundation. This year we ... hope to raise over $20,000,' executive director Nick Polsky said in a prepared statement. KAM provides services for breast cancer patients and their families.

The benefit can be seen as evidence that maturing rugby teams are taking on civic roles common among America's mainstream sports. In addition to raising a sum that would be the envy of many hand-to-mouth clubs -- particularly amid economic doldrums that have traditionally hit the sport hard -- the initiative shows San Francisco's elite at work on behalf of a so-called women's issue.

SFGG, which is hosting the March 6 game at its estimable Treasure Island facility, also stages a Thanksgiving fixture to help prevent teenage suicide, inspired by the loss of a high school player. Across country, the New York Athletic Club holds an annual game to honor players, many of them in public services, victimized by the September 11 terrorist attack.

For more and more teams, as philanthropy becomes part of their repetoire, so their overall organizational capacity increases.

The Pink Jersey, Pink Tie game derives revenue from match attendance, expected to rival or exceed Super League games because the game is a cross-town rivalry, as well as a postmatch reception and auction at one of the city's better hotels. Reception tickets are available at www.pinkjerseypinktie.org.

04 February 2010

Bryan Porter, whose sharp eye helped mold many of America's international referees, is stepping down from active duty with USARFU and the IRB.

Having emigrated from New Zealand some five decades ago, Porter played in San Francisco before taking up the whistle. He would have been a candidate for national honors at the time of the union's founding, but instead agreed to chair a new committee charged to standardize and improve the America's officiating.

Porter has held the role of national evaluator ever since. Most of the country's best and brightest, ranging from Dennis Shanagher, Ian Nixon, and Don Morrison to Don Reordan, Al Klemp, and latterly Dana Teagarden, would have worked extensively with the former insurance executive.

Like players, referees are promoted on the basis of consistently good performance, and an official's showing in high-stakes contests is thought to reflect on his referee society, if not the entire union. Even within rugby's closely knit fraternity, the matter of identifying and evaluating elite referees is an enigmatic calling, requiring judgment of technical skill and also temperament.

More a jocular fellow than eminence grise, Porter was often be found on the sidelines or under the referees' tent, intent on the craft. He is expected to continue working in the Northern California area, which boasts one of the country's larger and more active referee societies.

22 December 2009

Referee classifications are to be consolidated, in an effort to make more challenging games available to promising officials.

The rankings B3 to B1, indicative of a referee worthy of higher-level
matches in any given territory, will be grouped in a single T rating
beginning January 1. The purpose is to streamline opportunities for
evaluation and promotion.

'The requirements for getting promoted through the B grades were
essentially impossible to fulfill at the local and territorial level:
the requisite-level games were all national appointments. You almost
had to somehow earn national panel status in order to be assigned the
games necessary to earn national panel status,' referee and laws
committee chair Bruce Carter said in an email.

The national panel, the highest level, comprises roughly two dozen or so officials who referee Super League, national playoff matches, and the like. Some are further singled out as capable of handling international games.

America's referees are typically characterized as technically behind,
and a draft of USARFU's high performance plan offers few specifics for
improvement. The group's administrative practices are more nimble,
however, particularly when compared with, for example, the eligibility
committee.

The revised ranking approach could help younger officials advance more
quickly, something the IRB has sought to encourage. Like soccer,
rugby's governing body believes that men in their 50s are not fit to
officiate international athletes predominantly in their 20s.

Locally ranked officials also will be reclassified, with L4 as the
beginner's designation and L1 as the notch below the T level. As part
of the change, criteria for advancement to the L1 and T levels has been
stiffened slightly, Carter said.

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